Free – food and drink recipes

Author: Jeffrey Spahn

I know just how busy our lives are nowadays. With two little kids running around the house, a full time job and trying to stay in shape for a bicycle team, my time is stretched just about as far as you can without going crazy. The last thing you think you would have time for would be making a cake from scratch at home. After you see this super easy recipe with only 9 ingredients, you won’t ever want to go back to a boxed cake again.

Most of us have all of the ingredients we need to make a cake, we just don’t realize that it isn’t that hard to make one from scratch. Not only are you making something that you know exactly what goes into the cake but you are putting a little bit of yourself into the cake and that is truly something special.

Let’s dive into the recipe and instructions and you’ll see just how easy it is to make a standard white birthday cake. A simple recipe for basic vanilla frosting will follow the cake. I have used some things that you might have a variation of in your home. Instead of whole milk you might have 2%. Instead of cake flour you might have all purpose. You can use these but keep in mind they will change the texture a little bit.

Classic White Birthday Cake Recipe
Nonstick cooking spray with flour- Baker’s Joy works wonders!
2 1/4 cups cake flour (9 ounces)
1 cup whole milk , at room temperature
6 large egg whites (3/4 cup), at room temperature
2 teaspoons almond extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 3/4 cups granulated sugar (12 1/4 ounces)
4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon table salt
12 tablespoons softened unsalted butter (1 1/2 sticks)

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I had rhubarb in my fridge, and I had strawberries a little past their prime in my fridge; so I made rhubarb and strawberries!

The unrecipe is to chop rhubarb (about 5 stalks, in my case) into bits and put at the bottom of a saucepan and give it a sprinkling with a couple of tablespoons caster sugar (Normal sugar would probably work just as well; but I perceive the colour of rhubarb being nicer when I use caster sugar). Add just a little bit of water – a couple millimeters deep, so that the rhubarb has a chance to let go of it’s juice before burning becomes a problem.

In unrecipe land, I put quartered strawberries on top; and everything worked out fine.

In hindsight land, give the rhubarb a head start (over medium heat) before adding quartered strawberries.

In either case, cook the fruit over a medium heat until it’s pretty and pink; and the rhubarb has softened up.

Yum yum yum.